


He's Playing Our Song

by remy71923



Series: Modern Love [1]
Category: Black Widow (Comics), Captain America - All Media Types, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Eventual Romance, F/M, Family Fluff, Gen, Prom, Romantic Fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-09
Updated: 2019-11-09
Packaged: 2021-01-21 08:06:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,362
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21296237
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/remy71923/pseuds/remy71923
Summary: After struggling from alcoholism, battling depression, wading through one unsuccessful relationship to the next, Natasha Romanoff decided she could never again believe in love. That is, until, a certain somebody from her past resurfaced once again.Inspired by "He's Playing Our Song" by Mariclare Lawson, from the Modern Love section of the New York Times.
Relationships: Steve Rogers/Natasha Romanov
Series: Modern Love [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1533998
Comments: 5
Kudos: 82





	He's Playing Our Song

**Author's Note:**

> “I had spent my whole time in New York bouncing from one rejection to the next, believing that I was unlovable. Which made no sense to my prom date, because he told me there was someone loving me all those years: him.”

There came a point in Natasha Romanoff’s life where she felt that she’s _ absolutely _ done with love. She remembered being twenty-eight, and thinking that she shouldn’t even be _ allowed _ to date anyone anymore—drunk or sober, she never should. Never.

Her count of failed relationships wasn’t even feasible to be counted using her fingers of both of her hands. If she were to count the toes on her feet, then yeah, that would probably be as close to her count (that she knew and remembered, of course), and she considered this as remarkable. Because for someone who suffered anxiety and depression, had gone through alcoholism and back, it was impressive how she managed to even have men gathered up in her pool. It was impressive how she even managed to flirt with them, sleep with them, let alone _ talk _ to them.

But that point in her life came to a halt when she entered the bar they agreed upon, and she heard it. She heard the song being played on the piano.

And then she saw him, the one who was playing the piano, and it was as if her ability to speak with men had degraded back into the ability of that of a sixteen-year-old.

Sixteen-year-old Steve Rogers was an enigma, most especially to the sixteen-year-old Natasha.

And it wasn’t much of the usual high school cliche because he was the uncool nerd and she was the popular kid, or vice versa, it wasn’t at all like that. They were two high school classmates who never really knew much about each other, but always happened to _ be _ with each other because they were part of the same club. They worked together for their high school spring musical, where he was one of the instrumentalists playing the guitar, and she was one of the lead actors. But in instances like those, the band and the cast never really hung out, just acknowledge one another when something screws up during rehearsals, but beyond that, there was nothing.

And it didn’t help that Natasha was intrigued so much by Steve Rogers.

He was handsome, always was in Natasha’s eyes. He’s tall, taller than she was, had blonde hair and blue eyes and a big built. He was probably athletic, worked out a lot in his spare time if he weren’t rehearsing. He had a chiseled jaw, high cheekbones, and was overall very attractive, but he was also incredibly shy. He had few friends, one of which was Bucky Barnes, their football team’s quarterback, and while girls continue to chase after him, he turned each and every one of them down politely.

So she couldn’t help but be curious about this certain Steve Rogers.

She decided to act upon her curiosity by sitting with him during lunch one time. She had observed him enough to know that he usually waited for Bucky to finish his class before joining him for lunch, and they would eat together, just the two of them. She used to think they were a couple until Bucky hit on her once. She never really had an interest in him, so she turned him down, and that’s when he knew they may not really be a couple after all.

She could still remember the look of surprise on his face when she sat down in front of him. “Mind if I join you?” she asked.

He didn’t respond at first, his eyes wide in surprise. “N-no,” he stammered. “No, it’s...it’s fine.”

“We never really talked, but you know who I am, right?” she asked him, and he nodded, taking a bite from his sandwich.

“You’re Natasha,” he said. “One of the actors in the musical.” She nodded.

“And you’re Steve,” she said. “One of the guitarists in the musical.”

And they managed to hold a conversation over lunch, talking about rehearsals and the musical itself. It was that time that Natasha found Steve to be an amazing converser, as he spoke eloquently, and while he was shy, he spoke quite naturally too. She also found that she enjoyed listening to his voice, which was deep and soothing at the same time. She managed to make him laugh too, and she found that even his smile was beautiful, his laugh charming and a beautiful sound.

It quickly became one of her most favorite sounds.

The hour passed, and Natasha stood up from her seat. “Wh-where are you going?” Steve asked, his eyes widening in surprise as he looked at her.

“Off to my other friends,” she answered. “I know you have lunch with Barnes at this hour, and besides, my friends are waiting for me too.”

And then he managed a smirk. “Since when did you know I have lunch with Bucky at this hour?” he asked teasingly it made her want to slap off the smirk off his face.

But she instead rolled her eyes playfully at him. “Don’t push it, Rogers, I was just starting to like you,” she said, and he grinned mischievously it almost _ (almost) _ made her heart flutter. “See you at rehearsals.”

“See ya.”

It became a thing between them. Every once in a while, Natasha would walk up and sit across Steve for lunch for an hour, and they would talk, but they would mostly talk about the musical, and the rehearsals that occurred the night before or the week before (depending on when they really met for their thing). They never talked much about themselves, let alone anything beyond their club or the musical, since they only had an hour with each other, and since their musical was interesting enough to be a conversation starter, they did just that.

Natasha was aware of the growing feelings she was starting to feel for Steve, but she never really acted on it. She was anxious to, if she was being honest. She liked him, and she liked what they had, and if it were up to her, she would really like for them to go past talking about the musical. But she was scared it would all go to waste if she found that he didn’t feel the same way. And yes, she was afraid he might not feel the same, so she just let her emotions stay as they are: just emotions.

But then prom began to creep up on them, and she found those feelings _ very _ hard to suppress.

Because she really wanted to go with Steve so badly. And she had reached the point where she actually believed she was going to prom with him. She had told her friends that, as well as her parents and some strangers she met in bars, that this guy whose name was Steve Rogers would take her to the prom. She allowed herself and others to believe in it, so she was kind of forced now to act upon it. Act, so Steve _ can _ take her to the prom.

She decided to act on it when she offered Steve a ride home after rehearsals—something she thought she would never have done herself.

And then she got her momentum, despite the hammering of her heart inside her chest and the sweat beads forming on the side of her head. “Are you going to the prom?” she asked him coyly, and she felt his eyes on her.

“I’m...I’m not sure,” he answered. “Are you?”

That was it. That was the moment. “Yeah.” she responded.

“Oh,” he answered. “Are you going with someone?”

She shook her head, keeping her eyes on the road. “No.” she answered.

It took a moment, but Steve then asked, “Then...would you like to go with me?”

And that was that. Natasha’s mother flew to another state so she could buy her a beautiful prom dress, even hired the best hairdresser and make-up artist to do her hair and make-up for the prom. On the night of prom, she was ready, her face all made up, her hair done to a high bun with two loose hairs on each side of her head, and her dress, a navy blue strapless and backless A-line gown, worn so beautifully on her. The skirt had on an ombre design, the color fading from navy blue to white that reached the floor.

Steve had knocked on her door to pick her up, and he wore a three-piece navy blue suit bringing out his blue eyes, with his blonde hair waxed back. He was carrying a sunflower for her, which she gave after he smiled at her, telling her she was beautiful.

And of course, Natasha’s mother _ had _ to take photos of the two of them together, and so they posed on their backyard, a weird foot of distance between them, until they were eventually allowed to go. Steve drove them there, and they came in the hall together, her arm hooked around his.

The evening was lovely. Steve and Natasha managed to talk about things beyond the club they were in, and beyond the musical they worked on. They talked more about each other, and Natasha got to know that Steve indeed works out in his free time if he weren’t in rehearsals. He was also an only child like her, and had two lovely parents. He never had a girlfriend _ at all, _ mainly because he was hung up on this girl he tried to get her attention in middle school but never really got it. He was scared, he said, scared to try again, but then over time, he figured he just wasn’t really interested.

They mingled, talked, laughed and danced. It turns out Steve was never much of a dancer, but Natasha took the opportunity that evening to teach him how to, especially when the slow dance came in. He held her firmly yet gently, and his hand was calloused and rough against hers, but his touch was gentle. She kept on reminding him to keep his eyes on hers, and not down on their feet, and they began to dance smoothly, a smile lingering on Steve’s face as they did so. It was a beautiful night, magical, even, especially for Natasha.

But life wasn’t a fairy tale that ended in happily-ever-afters, and their story wasn't any different.

After the night of the prom, and eventually after the musical, their lunches had stopped, and it wasn’t like they were friends on any form of social media (because Natasha never liked having one, anyway). They would see each other in the hallways, and they would smile and say hi, but as high school passed, they stopped saying hi to each other.

And eventually, Natasha found herself in the series of string of relationships, and on the brink of an alcoholic addiction by her senior year in high school.

Natasha really was beautiful, if she would say so herself, and it wasn’t because of her high self-confidence or self-esteem (as she had neither, and to think she found herself beautiful without both meant she really _ was _ beautiful, right?) that she believed in it so. Boys lined up for her, and only in eleventh grade did she find it in herself to agree to the dates boys would ask her to. She would go out too, on evenings and weekends with her friends, and she would also meet men who would be interested in taking her home with them.

But Natasha figured beauty was nothing, really, when it came to love. Because even if she was beautiful, she still managed to be rejected every single time she would attempt a relationship.

In university, eventually on her sophomore year, just when things started going south starting with the disbandment of the marriage of her parents, she was diagnosed with anxiety and depression. On top of the antidepressants she was supposed to take on times she had mostly forgotten, she was also an _ immense _ alcoholic, thus the alcohol addiction. And she liked it better if she was drunk, because it meant she had the real guts to flirt with a man and allow him to take her home and sleep with her. If she were sober, she figured, she never would have done all of these.

If she were sober, she never would have survived the heartbreak she experienced on an almost weekly basis.

It went on, dragged on, until her senior year of college. By then, her best friend had advised that she took her medications for anxiety and depression seriously, and to go to rehab for her alcohol addiction to prepare for adult life. She eventually did, and by the time she was twenty-seven and already working as an editor in a fashion magazine, she was already sober.

Sober and pretty much done with love. Like she said, the number of heartbreaks she had experienced could complete the number of fingers and toes she had.

And by that time, she had also decided to join Facebook, much to her great chagrin, and much to her succumbing to the pressures put on her by her peers in college. One of her friends in high school had added her around the time she got sober, and as her welcoming gift to Natasha, she posted a throwback photo of her and Steve in prom in high school.

Steve. Huh. She’s never heard from him in such a long time.

And it wasn’t like she completely forgot about him, of course she didn’t. She just never actively _ looked _ for him per se, though she did try looking for him on the Internet. When she joined Facebook, she also searched for him, but couldn’t find him. It was like all traces of him were gone, and while she was disappointed, it was only for a moment—as she busied herself with other things (other relationships).

So she went on with her quest of treading through one (emotionally) abusive and unsuccessful relationship to the next, battling and pushing through experiences of being cheated on (or with), being manipulated and being considered merely a fling when it clearly meant so much more to her. That was along with bouts of alcoholism, antidepressants and anxiety attacks. She figured, too, that the men she was with were _emotionally_ abusive and never physically so, because of the value of her outward beauty. Who would want to destroy such a beautiful thing, right? But she also thought that it was all she was—physically beautiful, sexy and untouchable, but never one to be kept after sex and a night together.

So by the time she hit twenty-eight and had gone out of rehab, she was done with relationships. Until _ that _ fateful night.

She opened the notification, and found a photo of him and Steve during their prom. They were on the dance floor, her one hand resting on his shoulder, and another holding his hand, and his hand was resting on her waist, the other holding her other hand. They were smiling at each other, with Natasha laughing probably, and she couldn’t help but feel her heart flutter at the way he looked at her in the photo.

She never noticed it—how he looked at her, the way his gaze softened and his blue eyes sparkled in the photo as he smiled and looked at her. Not until now, anyway.

And when she looked down at the comments, she found out that his mother, Sarah, had commented down: “Oh my goodness! Steve would throw a fit seeing this photo hahahaha!”

And in a spur of the moment, where she had no idea where her bouts of inspiration had come from, she shot Sarah Rogers a message, telling her that she was Nat, and she went with Steve during prom in high school, and she was wondering how he was doing, where he might be, and how she might be able to keep in touch with him. She wanted to reconnect, reconnect with someone who first managed to make her heart beat in high school, and still somehow managed to do the same until now, more than ten years later.

Sarah responded quickly. Steve moved in Los Angeles after high school, and had lived there since. But he’s back in town for a week to visit his family and play a gig with his band. _ He was in a band. _ Sarah was quick to tell Natasha also that Steve didn’t have any form of social media account but he did tell his mother to tell Natasha to meet him in a bar near her former university on a Thursday night, at 7pm.

Natasha agreed, and though she could have asked for his number so they can communicate better, she didn’t. She supposed that she trusted him enough that he will show up, that for some reason she had faith in this guy she went to prom with in high school, and barely knew anything about.

And so on Thursday night, she stepped into the bar at 7:02pm, and then she heard it—the song they were dancing to in prom in high school, being played on the piano. Amazed by Lonestar. She could still remember it, recognize it as she heard it as if she was taken back on the evening of their high school prom as she heard it being played on the piano that night.

By no other than Steve.

He turned when she entered, and he smiled, and she smiled back. He looked more or less the same, but even so, her breath still caught in her throat when she looked at those same sparkly blue eyes she thought she had forgotten about a decade ago. He stood up from the piano and led her to a booth in the corner, where they sat across from each other, a table separating them. Natasha figured that sitting across a stranger whom you knew for such a long time felt both familiar yet so unbearable. What was she thinking? What was she doing?

But she pushed all of those thoughts away, and took a leap of faith. They talked, chattered, and laughed the evening away, over drinks, nacho chips and buffalo wings. Because for some reason Natasha found it so easy to talk to him, and she found that Steve still held his best conversation skills when it came to her. He always kept her on her toes for more of his stories, and she, in turn, told him all of hers.

She told him her secrets: the ones she had in high school, and the ones she had even a decade later. He told her about his secrets: the ones he had in high school, and the ones he accumulated over the past decade they spent apart.

Their conversation didn’t end that night, and their conversation lasted for two days, until he had to go back to Los Angeles where he lived, but even then they never stopped talking.

And thank God they never stopped.

Natasha smiles as she thinks back at how she thought, at twenty-eight, she would be done with love, done with relationships, of trying again in committing in real relationships, let alone _ hoping _ for a good one. She lets out a soft chuckle at herself, how, five years later, in the present, the thought of ever trying again in love that had seemed to loom over her mind since high school seemed so pathetic now. She looks up when the door opens and her smile widens as she continues to swing gently on her rocking chair.

“You both doing okay?” Steve asks softly, walking over with a smile as he leans down to press a kiss on her head. He sits on the stool beside the rocking chair and rests his hand on the head of their red-haired baby boy, with his lips puckered, his small fists clenched under his chin and his lashes long enough for it to be touching his rosy cheeks slightly, as he sleeps peacefully in his mother’s arms. “This little guy seemed content with his Mommy.” He leans down to press a small and gentle kiss on the three-month-old’s forehead.

“You think he got tired of being the center of everyone’s attention?” Natasha asks softly at her husband._ Husband. _ It puts a smile on her face as she thinks about it, as she looks at Steve’s blue eyes that still holds the same sparkle it had during their prom night all those years ago.

“Certainly hope not, or else he wouldn’t be his Mommy’s little boy for that,” Steve answers, gasping mockingly and playfully and Natasha smacks him lightly on his arm, and he laughs softly, pressing another kiss on the side of her head. Natasha smiles and turns her head so he can press a sweet chaste kiss on her lips. “He’s going to be Daddy’s little boy.”

“Please, sweetie, like _ you’re _ never one for the spotlight.” Natasha shoots playfully, raising an eyebrow and smirking at Steve who laughs softly and shakes his head.

Because, she thinks, if they ever did stop, she wouldn’t have believed in love again, and all its existence, its beauty, its pain and its lessons. If they ever stopped, she wouldn’t have allowed herself to fall in love again, let alone allow herself to trust someone enough to get close to her. If they stopped, she wouldn’t have experienced a beautiful wedding, marrying the love of her life three years after that fateful meeting in the bar where he played their song. She never would have walked down the aisle with a bouquet of sunflowers that he carefully picked as she looked at him, waiting for her at the end of the aisle, wearing almost the same three-piece suit that he wore during their prom more than a decade ago, one that brought out the color of his eyes as he watched her with a huge and beautiful smile on his face and love in his eyes. If they ever stopped, she wouldn’t have _ this: _her beautiful family, their beautiful son, their beautiful home and their lovely friends who are all downstairs gathered in their living room.

And every bit of her _ loved _ being here.

She never liked dwelling on the past, let alone thinking of what her life might have turned out if she never took that leap of faith, the one where she incited him in asking her out to prom with him, let alone taking that small leap of faith of sitting across him during that one lunch day in high school just because she got curious about who he was. She never liked dwelling on how life might have turned out if they never had those one-hour talks of their rehearsals and their high school musical, or where they might have ended up if they didn’t go together during prom. She never liked thinking of where they might be now, if she hadn’t joined Facebook, and she never took that leap of faith to message Sarah Rogers where her son might be and how she might be able to reach him.

More so, she never wanted to think of what it might have felt like if she hadn’t recognized the song he was playing in the piano when they met for the first time again after a decade. He was playing their song.

She thought she might have still been that bitter, recovering alcoholic twenty-eight-year-old if all of those ever did come true. But thankfully, here she is, a thirty-three-year-old who believes in love and lives in it everyday, wife to the man she went to high school prom with, and mother to the most wonderful and most beautiful boy she had ever seen.

There’s nowhere else she’d rather be.

“Hey,” he says softly, catching his wife’s attention once again. He gives her a soft smile, as he runs his fingers through her scarlet wavy hair, pulling her close to press a kiss on her temple. “What are you thinking about?”

All the what-might-have-beens, she wants to say, but she figures if she never wanted to think of them in the first place, then perhaps maybe so would he. The what-might-have-beens are unnecessary at this point, where they find themselves in a happy and content place, where their life together of five years just keeps on getting happier and more exciting as each day passes.

So she gives him a smile, a wide smile, and she shakes her head. “Nothing,” she answers softly. “Just nothing.” But Steve frowns slightly and she laughs softly, leaning in to press a kiss on his lips, turning his slight frown into his usual gentle smile.

She spent a majority of a decade jumping from one failed relationship to the next, one unattached fling to the other, drowning in alcohol and antidepressant pills, allowing herself to make her feel that she was unlovable. She remembered telling Steve about this a year after they first saw each other in that bar, a year after he played their song on the piano. She told him about all of her secrets, her past addictions and recovered mental issues, her failed dating history, how she could never believe she could ever be loved fully by someone ever again, how she believed that she was unlovable.

She also remembered Steve getting surprised by it. She was surprised when Steve, her prom date from over a decade ago during that time, someone whom she barely knew, told her that there was someone loving her in all those years: him. Even from afar, even from a distance, even from a long period of time, he loved her, and he never stopped doing so.

“Steve,” she says softly, and Steve hums as he looks at her, those blue eyes holding the same sparkle and love and happiness reserved only for her, when he looks at her. She smiles at him, leaning over once again to press a longer kiss on his lips. “I love you.”

He smiles against her mouth, and kisses her back softly. He pulls away slightly so he can kiss the tip of her nose, their foreheads resting against each other. “I love you more,” he tells her softy. “I love you too.”

And she believes him.


End file.
